While the dust in Port Harcourt, Rivers State on the crisis over the People Democratic party PDP national convention is yet to settle, the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport CILT is set for another Port Harcourt saga over its national elections this week.
Following the recent protest by the Lagos members of CILT over the plans by its national executives to hold the elections in Port Harcourt, most members remain ignorant and confused about the feasibility of the elections scheduled to hold on Thursday and Friday this week.
A current executive member of the CILT Lagos Branch who pleaded anonymity told MMS Plus that the possibility of the elections holding this week is zero, but the national president Major-General Umar Usman thinks otherwise.
The controversy in CILT led one of the Presidential candidates, Mr. Jubril Ibrahim to make an attempt at obtaining a court injunction to stop the national conference and elections from holding in Port Harcourt, Rivers state.
Jubril has cited insecurity and purported that there were plans to rig the election in favour of another Presidential candidate, Kayode Oyesiku.
However when questioned by our correspondent, Jubril’s disposition seemed to have changed as he couldn’t confirm that he was contesting for the position of the president. He also declined being aware of any court injunction and stated that the rift in CILT has been resolved.
Jubril’s response indicates that he may have decided to step down even as he declined to speak further, referring the MMS Plus correspondent to the CILT national secretariat for more findings.
Meanwhile, the CILT National President Major General Umar Usman has waved off the recent protest by members in the CILT Lagos chapter as irrelevant.
Usman, who is believed to have endorsed Prof. Oyesiku as his successor, asserted that the CILT Lagos members were exercising their constitutional rights to protest but maintained that the protest had not stopped the preparations to hold the national elections in Port Harcourt.
“People have their rights to protest. I was told that there was a minor protest but the council has made its decision and the elections would go ahead as planned in Port Harcourt”, Usman told MMS Plus.
Meanwhile, the former Chairperson CILT Lagos Branch, Mrs. Fatima Diko-Kuton who led the Lagos members to protest at the CILT national headquarters in Lagos recently, maintained that the notice of change was too sudden for members who had concluded plans to attend the Conference and AGM in Lagos.
“This is an election year which requires a more careful and well calculated decision on the location and timing so as not to discourage attendance of members. As at now, the safety and security of people in Niger-Delta area, particularly Port Harcourt was not considered by the Council before arriving at this dangerous decision.
“Because of security challenges, Rivers state election was postponed indefinitely by the electoral committee, some professional bodies that wanted to hold their programmes in Port Harcourt had moved such programmes to other areas of the country where safety is relatively guaranteed” she said.
Fatima noted that Lagos and its environs had about 90% of the total membership of the Institute, stressing there was no justification for the move. She also asserted that the move may be one of the ploys by the Presidency to manipulate the impending elections.
“We have authoritative information that the President has concluded plans to manipulate the election process in favour of some candidates. These so called loyalists have joined the President to pervert the cause of justice, equity and every sense of reasonableness” Fatima lamented.
The maritime populace and members on the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport wait eagerly as the August 25th – 26th scheduled date for the election draws nearer in a city notorious for inconclusive and violent elections in recent times.
CILT Nigeria has always organized its conferences and other major programmes in Lagos with the exception in 2006, when the AGM held in Ogun State and Ogun State is still not too far from the headquarters of CILT Nigeria in Lagos, so it was easy for members to attend.
Sometime in 2012, the Africa Forum which has been the biggest international event ever hosted by CILT Nigeria was held in Abuja but the event was organized for the continent and not specifically for Nigeria.
On the impending elections, the leadership of CILT Nigeria had insinuated that the event would be sponsored by the Rivers State Government or any of its Agencies or Ministries, but the President is yet to send members the alleged letter of sponsorship by the Rivers State Government or any of its Agencies or Ministries.
Members have also being kept in the dark as to the extent of sponsorship and the items to be sponsored by the Rivers State Government, such as the capacity of the hall, its security as well as the security of the environment.
By Kenneth Jukpor
